Every new Presidential Administration and Congressional Session begins with new education agendas that either can create positive change or send education spiraling backward as has historically been the case here in the United States, all under the guise of “Education Reform”. The term “education reform” is pervasively overused politically for many purposes in both productive and at times nonproductive ways to represent ideas that at times have absolutely nothing to do with actually improving our nation’s educational institutions and at other times are exactly the types of changes that can make a positive impact on educational progress for our nation. This reflection will answer the following critical federal education reform questions such as:
1. What exactly is Education Reform?
2. Who or what in education has to be “reformed”?
3. What within education must be reformed or remediated? Why?
4. Who or what determines our nation’s federal education priorities K through 12? Why?
In this final reflection in regard to contemporary education concerns and remedies, I will discuss work being done regarding K through 12 education and what I believe can be achieved at the federal government level for education in the United States. The two major federal reforms that I will discuss are No Child Left Behind(NCLB) and Race to The Top(RTTT) since our nation’s schools have been impacted by both of these federal US Department of Education reform policies or mandates since the funding rules for both programs are complex and at times unattainable which I will explain throughout this reflection. Education Reform Defined
Every politico has their own distinct definition of what “education reform” means to her or him in relation to distributing this definition in a populist manner to various audiences throughout a particular voting district in Anytown, USA. This may lead you to instantly conclude that these education reform definitions change like the wind direction. In truth, that is exactly what political rhetoric does. It changes with the wind direction. Allow me to take the hot air or wind out of the rhetorical sails in terms of the definition of education reform. First of all, education as defined in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary means the action or process of teaching someone especially in a school, college, or university
as well as “the knowledge, skill, and understanding that you get from attending a school, college, or university” Education. (n.d.). Retrieved July 27, 2014, from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/education . Reform for the intent and purpose of this final reflection is to improve (someone or something) by removing or correcting faults, problems, etc. ("Reform." Merriam-Webster.com. Merriam-Webster, n.d. Web. 27 July 2014, from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/reform). In these definitions, the most critical part of education reform is left out which is the plan of action to improve education or the process of learning in our country which is where NCLB and RTTT fit in. The monikers of these federal education policies are aspiring and definitely aim for a sense of urgency and an act of moving American students forward K through 12 but I will point out a few positive outcomes and downfalls of these federal education plans in terms of the overall impacts to teachers, students, and the condition of education in the United States.
I will also discuss the impacts of these federal education policies on Rhode Island schools. One of my favorite excerpts from Reign of Error is the statement, ”The ‘reform’ movement is really a ‘corporate’ reform movement, funded to a large degree by major foundations, Wall Street hedge fund managers, entrepreneurs, and the US Department of Education”(Ravitch, 2013). I agree with Ravitch in regard to the fact that education has adopted more of a business model than a human services one, especially since NCLB and RTTT were instituted. If your school’s standardized test scores do not go up, the federal government can do the following: take over the school’s oversight, prescribe merit pay, get rid of teacher tenure out of fear of retaining “bad” teachers, label your school as “failing” and local officials are able to recommend mass teacher terminations and school closings all in the name of “education reform”. Federal Education Reform Impact on RI Schools I see a very lopsided budgetary item when analyzing the state budget for RTTT for 2013 when comparing Personnel and Fringe Benefit costs with Quality Teacher Professional Development costs. Teacher professional development cost the state $607,500 and personnel plus fringe benefits to being a contractor or employee of RI Department of Education cost the state $6,191,248. Even the teacher evaluation system cost more than teacher training at $7,933,217.(Gist, 2013) The money problem is that if your primary reform is to get highly qualified teachers into every classroom, would it not be prudent to get those teachers as much professional development training as possible? Individual school districts got the bulk of the RTTT money which was spent as each district saw fit without much input from the state as to how the funds should be applied which has historically been a major problem with education spending in general. Some districts bought Ipads or laptops for every student such as Chariho and East Greenwich School Districts. It will take years likely before any positive gains can be verified as a direct result from these types of expensive technology purchases by school districts in terms of increasing NECAP scores or overall learner outcomes in these districts. Will these gadgets make the students smarter? Perhaps, but someone made money off of those sales which is the business side or Ravitch would argue the evil side of education reform, entrepreneurs making money off of the RTTT funding structure. National Impacts of NCLB and RTTT: What in Regard to National Education Has to Be Reformed or Remediated?
Positive results of the RTTT funding to bring up student overall achievement in my opinion was the additional attention given to math and reading literacy to offer students support and assistance who are learning challenged or ELLs. NCLB had no focus on ESL or learning challenged children and they were not part of the federal school improvement focus under NCLB. I know this because I taught in a school district where many of my students were ELLs. ELL or learning challenged children simply were not given the state standardized tests. RTTT mandates that all students have to take the high stakes standardized tests with or without learning challenges with an “All are Welcome” approach to high stakes testing. The serious drawbacks are that researchers are attributing these tests to anxiety issues in children and teachers having their jobs threatened if their student test scores do not improve. Students of children attending school in the Bronx section of NYC organized a boycott of the English Common Core Standardized State Exam because of extreme test anxiety concerns as well as worries that many of their ESOL children would not get enough time to complete portions of the exam as well as teachers admitting that they “had never seen so many blank stares” along with concerns that teachers were not fully trained to successfully administer the exam(Hernandez, 2013). A New York City teacher in one of the top 25 schools in the entire state of New York, Elizabeth Phillips(Phillips, 2013) admits that she finds major flaws with the way common core tests themselves were worded without any relevancy to the urban setting that her students live in, material so unfamiliar that her students spent most of the testing time trying to figure out word usage issues, never mind answering the essay questions. She also argues that there are very high stakes in terms of impacts on the entire school district; the tests also did not accurately test the children for the common core curriculum standards such as reading comprehension due to the poor layout of the actual test. For example instead of asking about a passage’s meaning, students were to figure out structural components of the paragraphs which she found to be ridiculous.
Why is this Common Core Test criticism important? It is important because those that are creating this dilemma missed the part about how not all learners have similar learning styles or similar backgrounds. It is blanket testing for the entire country that determines whether or not teachers and principals are fired as well as whether or not student funding increases or decreases within a school district. The school districts get more money if they adopt Common Core Standards. It is Pearson gag orders and the almighty cash incentive changing education for our nation’s children again without any regard for the well-being of the children being tested. Who is going to deal with the crying or becoming ill due to test anxiety of children during the test taking time? It will not be President Obama, the State School Commissioners nor any of the RTTT policymakers. It will be the teachers and students who will have to deal with the immediate impacts of the RTTT Common Core mandates for better or worse. As Diane Ravitch(Ravitch, 2013) so eloquently puts it in Reign of Error, “The reformers are putting the nation’s children on a train that is headed for a cliff”. I say that it is time to get off the train of high stakes testing before it completely derails, the same testing that prevents some students from graduating from high school across the country in states such as Rhode Island, Arizona, and Kentucky, targets teachers’ evaluations, and has flawed content that is not an accurate picture of the learning taking place in our nation’s classrooms. So, how does a state get rid of RTTT and the Common Core Standards? The state’s legislature can have Common Core and its mandates legally null and void. Forty-four of the fifty states have adopted Common Core with Tennessee, Alaska, Texas, Oklahoma, South Dakota, and Minnesota being the hold out states (Common Core State Standards Initiative, n.d., 2014,from http://www.corestandards.org/standards-in-your-state/ ). States such as Indiana and Ohio are working to repeal all or part of the Common Core test requirement passage for high school graduation. It is rumored that many more states are soon going to follow their lead, Rhode Island’s governor already publicly removed this year’s NECAP test passage Common Core requirement for high school senior which will likely be delayed again by the next state governor. Other states are totally reworking the Common Core state standards back to their previous state requirements before Common Core came on the scene(US News, n.d. 2014, from http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/01/31/more-states-seek-to-repeal-common-core ). My Conclusion Regarding Federal Education Policy;Who or what determines our nation’s federal education priorities K through 12 and why?
Finally, I will do my best to answer the question of who or what group of individuals should be responsible for determining school curriculum and state standards for learning for our nation’s children. We are a nation built upon radical individualism, at least according to the British who we gained our independence from many eons ago. It is common sense that one test will never successfully apply to so many different individual learners. Curriculum content testing is not a one size fits all process of evaluation. Our schools are not in dire need of an overhaul as some like to believe. I believe as Ravitch(Ravitch, 2013) does that there are many progressive constructive steps that can be taken to make our schools high functioning places where all children can get an equal excellent education as mandated in our US Constitution from Pre-K through to high school graduation. In order to level the learner playing field, all schools must do their part to make sure that teachers have manageable classroom sizes, that there are wraparound services to address poverty related barriers to learning such as nutrition and transportation as well as adequate accelerated learning opportunities for our nation’s educationally at risk and ESL students. Testing for grade level subject matter should be handled locally on a district by district basis with national guidelines in regard to curriculum but allowances made for learning challenged students. Until then, we are only getting a picture of how well we are teaching our nation’s children to a test, not really testing the content that our students have learned year to year from their teachers and from life’s lessons. Basically, my final conclusion on federal education policy is that it should come from those who are in the classroom, on the front lines of our nation’s educational system, making decisions that will best serve our nation’s diverse student population to prepare our children to take their places as valuable participants in a global community with the educational, career related, and life skills necessary to thrive in a global economy both within and beyond our nation’s borders.
EDC 503-Final Exam
Lara Wibeto
Dr. Fogleman
Every new Presidential Administration and Congressional Session begins with new education agendas that either can create positive change or send education spiraling backward as has historically been the case here in the United States, all under the guise of “Education Reform”. The term “education reform” is pervasively overused politically for many purposes in both productive and at times nonproductive ways to represent ideas that at times have absolutely nothing to do with actually improving our nation’s educational institutions and at other times are exactly the types of changes that can make a positive impact on educational progress for our nation. This reflection will answer the following critical federal education reform questions such as:
1. What exactly is Education Reform?
2. Who or what in education has to be “reformed”?
3. What within education must be reformed or remediated? Why?
4. Who or what determines our nation’s federal education priorities K through 12? Why?
In this final reflection in regard to contemporary education concerns and remedies, I will discuss work being done regarding K through 12 education and what I believe can be achieved at the federal government level for education in the United States. The two major federal reforms that I will discuss are No Child Left Behind(NCLB) and Race to The Top(RTTT) since our nation’s schools have been impacted by both of these federal US Department of Education reform policies or mandates since the funding rules for both programs are complex and at times unattainable which I will explain throughout this reflection.
Education Reform Defined
Every politico has their own distinct definition of what “education reform” means to her or him in relation to distributing this definition in a populist manner to various audiences throughout a particular voting district in Anytown, USA. This may lead you to instantly conclude that these education reform definitions change like the wind direction. In truth, that is exactly what political rhetoric does. It changes with the wind direction. Allow me to take the hot air or wind out of the rhetorical sails in terms of the definition of education reform. First of all, education as defined in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary means the action or process of teaching someone especially in a school, college, or university
as well as “the knowledge, skill, and understanding that you get from attending a school, college, or university” Education. (n.d.). Retrieved July 27, 2014, from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/education . Reform for the intent and purpose of this final reflection is to improve (someone or something) by removing or correcting faults, problems, etc. ("Reform." Merriam-Webster.com. Merriam-Webster, n.d. Web. 27 July 2014, from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/reform). In these definitions, the most critical part of education reform is left out which is the plan of action to improve education or the process of learning in our country which is where NCLB and RTTT fit in. The monikers of these federal education policies are aspiring and definitely aim for a sense of urgency and an act of moving American students forward K through 12 but I will point out a few positive outcomes and downfalls of these federal education plans in terms of the overall impacts to teachers, students, and the condition of education in the United States.
I will also discuss the impacts of these federal education policies on Rhode Island schools. One of my favorite excerpts from Reign of Error is the statement, ”The ‘reform’ movement is really a ‘corporate’ reform movement, funded to a large degree by major foundations, Wall Street hedge fund managers, entrepreneurs, and the US Department of Education”(Ravitch, 2013). I agree with Ravitch in regard to the fact that education has adopted more of a business model than a human services one, especially since NCLB and RTTT were instituted. If your school’s standardized test scores do not go up, the federal government can do the following: take over the school’s oversight, prescribe merit pay, get rid of teacher tenure out of fear of retaining “bad” teachers, label your school as “failing” and local officials are able to recommend mass teacher terminations and school closings all in the name of “education reform”.
Federal Education Reform Impact on RI Schools
I see a very lopsided budgetary item when analyzing the state budget for RTTT for 2013 when comparing Personnel and Fringe Benefit costs with Quality Teacher Professional Development costs. Teacher professional development cost the state $607,500 and personnel plus fringe benefits to being a contractor or employee of RI Department of Education cost the state $6,191,248. Even the teacher evaluation system cost more than teacher training at $7,933,217.(Gist, 2013) The money problem is that if your primary reform is to get highly qualified teachers into every classroom, would it not be prudent to get those teachers as much professional development training as possible?
Individual school districts got the bulk of the RTTT money which was spent as each district saw fit without much input from the state as to how the funds should be applied which has historically been a major problem with education spending in general. Some districts bought Ipads or laptops for every student such as Chariho and East Greenwich School Districts. It will take years likely before any positive gains can be verified as a direct result from these types of expensive technology purchases by school districts in terms of increasing NECAP scores or overall learner outcomes in these districts. Will these gadgets make the students smarter? Perhaps, but someone made money off of those sales which is the business side or Ravitch would argue the evil side of education reform, entrepreneurs making money off of the RTTT funding structure.
National Impacts of NCLB and RTTT: What in Regard to National Education Has to Be Reformed or Remediated?
Positive results of the RTTT funding to bring up student overall achievement in my opinion was the additional attention given to math and reading literacy to offer students support and assistance who are learning challenged or ELLs. NCLB had no focus on ESL or learning challenged children and they were not part of the federal school improvement focus under NCLB. I know this because I taught in a school district where many of my students were ELLs. ELL or learning challenged children simply were not given the state standardized tests. RTTT mandates that all students have to take the high stakes standardized tests with or without learning challenges with an “All are Welcome” approach to high stakes testing. The serious drawbacks are that researchers are attributing these tests to anxiety issues in children and teachers having their jobs threatened if their student test scores do not improve. Students of children attending school in the Bronx section of NYC organized a boycott of the English Common Core Standardized State Exam because of extreme test anxiety concerns as well as worries that many of their ESOL children would not get enough time to complete portions of the exam as well as teachers admitting that they “had never seen so many blank stares” along with concerns that teachers were not fully trained to successfully administer the exam(Hernandez, 2013). A New York City teacher in one of the top 25 schools in the entire state of New York, Elizabeth Phillips(Phillips, 2013) admits that she finds major flaws with the way common core tests themselves were worded without any relevancy to the urban setting that her students live in, material so unfamiliar that her students spent most of the testing time trying to figure out word usage issues, never mind answering the essay questions. She also argues that there are very high stakes in terms of impacts on the entire school district; the tests also did not accurately test the children for the common core curriculum standards such as reading comprehension due to the poor layout of the actual test. For example instead of asking about a passage’s meaning, students were to figure out structural components of the paragraphs which she found to be ridiculous.
Why is this Common Core Test criticism important? It is important because those that are creating this dilemma missed the part about how not all learners have similar learning styles or similar backgrounds. It is blanket testing for the entire country that determines whether or not teachers and principals are fired as well as whether or not student funding increases or decreases within a school district. The school districts get more money if they adopt Common Core Standards. It is Pearson gag orders and the almighty cash incentive changing education for our nation’s children again without any regard for the well-being of the children being tested.
Who is going to deal with the crying or becoming ill due to test anxiety of children during the test taking time? It will not be President Obama, the State School Commissioners nor any of the RTTT policymakers. It will be the teachers and students who will have to deal with the immediate impacts of the RTTT Common Core mandates for better or worse. As Diane Ravitch(Ravitch, 2013) so eloquently puts it in Reign of Error, “The reformers are putting the nation’s children on a train that is headed for a cliff”. I say that it is time to get off the train of high stakes testing before it completely derails, the same testing that prevents some students from graduating from high school across the country in states such as Rhode Island, Arizona, and Kentucky, targets teachers’ evaluations, and has flawed content that is not an accurate picture of the learning taking place in our nation’s classrooms.
So, how does a state get rid of RTTT and the Common Core Standards? The state’s legislature can have Common Core and its mandates legally null and void. Forty-four of the fifty states have adopted Common Core with Tennessee, Alaska, Texas, Oklahoma, South Dakota, and Minnesota being the hold out states (Common Core State Standards Initiative, n.d., 2014,from http://www.corestandards.org/standards-in-your-state/ ). States such as Indiana and Ohio are working to repeal all or part of the Common Core test requirement passage for high school graduation. It is rumored that many more states are soon going to follow their lead, Rhode Island’s governor already publicly removed this year’s NECAP test passage Common Core requirement for high school senior which will likely be delayed again by the next state governor. Other states are totally reworking the Common Core state standards back to their previous state requirements before Common Core came on the scene(US News, n.d. 2014, from http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/01/31/more-states-seek-to-repeal-common-core ).
My Conclusion Regarding Federal Education Policy;Who or what determines our nation’s federal education priorities K through 12 and why?
Finally, I will do my best to answer the question of who or what group of individuals should be responsible for determining school curriculum and state standards for learning for our nation’s children. We are a nation built upon radical individualism, at least according to the British who we gained our independence from many eons ago. It is common sense that one test will never successfully apply to so many different individual learners. Curriculum content testing is not a one size fits all process of evaluation. Our schools are not in dire need of an overhaul as some like to believe. I believe as Ravitch(Ravitch, 2013) does that there are many progressive constructive steps that can be taken to make our schools high functioning places where all children can get an equal excellent education as mandated in our US Constitution from Pre-K through to high school graduation.
In order to level the learner playing field, all schools must do their part to make sure that teachers have manageable classroom sizes, that there are wraparound services to address poverty related barriers to learning such as nutrition and transportation as well as adequate accelerated learning opportunities for our nation’s educationally at risk and ESL students. Testing for grade level subject matter should be handled locally on a district by district basis with national guidelines in regard to curriculum but allowances made for learning challenged students. Until then, we are only getting a picture of how well we are teaching our nation’s children to a test, not really testing the content that our students have learned year to year from their teachers and from life’s lessons. Basically, my final conclusion on federal education policy is that it should come from those who are in the classroom, on the front lines of our nation’s educational system, making decisions that will best serve our nation’s diverse student population to prepare our children to take their places as valuable participants in a global community with the educational, career related, and life skills necessary to thrive in a global economy both within and beyond our nation’s borders.
Bibliography
Education. Merriam-Webster, (n.d.). Retrieved July 27, 2014, from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/education .
Reform. Merriam-Webster, n.d. Web. 27 July 2014, from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/reform)
Reign of Error, Ravitch, D. 2013, P. 5, 18, 253-260.
Stepping Up for Progress. Gist, D. August 2013, from http://www.ride.ri.gov/Portals/0/Uploads/Documents/RTTT/Rhode-Island-Race-to-the-Top-Year-Three-Report.pdf
A Tough New test Spurs Protest and Tears, Hernandez, J. April 19,2013, from http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/19/education/common-core-testing-spurs-outrage-and-protest-among-parents.html?_r=0
We Need to Talk About the Test, Phillips, E. 2014, from http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/10/opinion/the-problem-with-the-common-core.html?_r=0
More States Seek to Repeal Common Core,n.d.,2014, from http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/01/31/more-states-seek-to-repeal-common-core .
Common Core State Standards Initiative Interactive Map. n.d.,2014, from http://www.corestandards.org/standards-in-your-state/ .